Alcester 1-1 FC Stratford

Alcester Town FC hosted FC Stratford with the home team looking to avenge their earlier defeat in the season. Manager Danny Janes handed starts to debutant Josh Moore, Brendan Hicks and captain Keiran Downey.

Alcester started the better of the two sides and found success with the pace and direct play of Davies, Hicks and Moore caused problems. Alcester’s pressure was rewarded as Downey reacted to a loose ball from a corner to slot the ball past the goalkeeper.

Alcester continued to press as they looked for a second goal, however, both teams were affected by the heavy pitch.

Stratford started the second half strongly as they looked to level the scores. The opposition started to outnumber Alcester in midfield as they found gaps to run into.

The Alcester defence stood up to the task as they limited Stratford’s chances. Alcester looked to play on the counter as Stratford began to throw players forward. Stratford were eventually rewarded for their dominance when Alcester defender Ben Pattison directed the ball into his own net in an attempt to head it over the bar.

Stratford continued to press for a winner, but it was Alcester who looked more like scoring on the break. Davies drove with the ball to the by-line and played an excellent ball across the box, only for substitute Layton to narrowly miss. Goodhall and Moore also had good chances to re-gain Alcester’s lead but their efforts were blocked and missed the target.

Danny Janes said: “I think the draw was a fair result. The pitch was terrible and it impacted on the quality of both sides, it was very difficult to try and play football on. I thought we edged the first half, however, Stratford put us under a lot of pressure in the second half.

"I was really pleased with the way we soaked up all their pressure, on another day we could have nicked it at the end as we had some very good chances. Stratford deserved to equalise because of the amount of pressure they applied, Ben was unfortunate with the own goal – he tried to do the right thing but just didn’t get enough on the header.

“I go into every game believing we are good enough to win, we aim to win every game. On reflection the draw was a fair result, but we had chances at the end. I spoke to the players about being ruthless at different stages of the game, when we were presented with those chances we should have taken the points. I am sure Stratford will feel they deserved to potentially take more from the game because of their second half dominance."

“I was very pleased with Josh Moore, my assistant Rich recommended him and I thought he gave us a different dimension to our game. We have two important games now which we must win, we can’t afford to drop anymore points”.